


rigor mortis

by indefensibleselfindulgence



Category: Campaign (Podcast): Skyjacks, Campaign: Skyjacks (Podcast)
Genre: Canon Typical Weirdness, Character Study, Gen, Necromancy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-22
Updated: 2018-12-22
Packaged: 2019-09-24 18:12:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,252
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17105633
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/indefensibleselfindulgence/pseuds/indefensibleselfindulgence
Summary: He's a skyjack so, of course, he's seen it before.The moment someone actually dies.





	rigor mortis

**Author's Note:**

> i have a whole bunch of feelings about anxiety necromancer kids
> 
> (how do you tag anything why are there three different fandom tags)
> 
> not beta'd

He's a skyjack so, of course, he's seen it before.  
  
The moment someone actually dies.  
  
And it's magical. It's magical every time. He could commit this to memory and play it over hundreds of thousands of times in his mind. It's beautiful beyond measure, he thinks privately. The last exhalation, the loosening of the muscles, the look in their eyes when they realize that's it, it's over, it's done, and they're all alone. It's a private treasure, just for him and the poor man who decided to catch a sword between his ribs.    
  
The reality of the situation- the blood that splatters on his face when the man coughs is enough to make Dref reel and almost fall of the side of the ship before Gable grabs him by tunic and tugs. His body collides with theirs, and that's scary too- something against the underside of Gable's skin moves, and he can feel it moving, weird, weird and bad and weird- but it's better than plummeting into the ocean.  
  
“You okay?” He nods and stammers out his gratitude, and they give him a pat on the shoulder before giving one of their war cries, loud, deafening, and attacking the next cluster of pirates they see on the mast.  
  
He desperately tries to scrub the blood off of his face.    
  
The man, the dead man, bleeds out too and Dref can feel it seeping into his shoes. Upsetting. All in all upsetting.

Kind of a bad day.  
  
When Gable and Travis call a team meeting, he has a hard time paying attention. They give up fairly quickly with him. The bodies are in his office, and that's all he can think about. Sinking his fingers where they shouldn't go and doing something that spits in the face of god or the gods or just basic human decency. Jury's still out.  
  
He can feel the magic build in his arms. Always could when he's excited to work. If he waits too long, his muscles start locking up, and it feels like his skin boils.  
  
Jonnit finally burst through the door, complaining that they left him out of the meeting _Again_ and it really does keep happening. Maybe he should start calling them. Dref slips through the door and heads below deck to where his office, to where the bodies are.  
  
The one that got blood on him lays at the top of the pile, and Dref's hands twitch with anticipation.  
  
He closes the man's eyes and places his hand on top before pushing the magic through his palm and steps out of the way when the body jolts and falls off of the others. It trembles for a moment before going dead still. He counts the seconds out on the wristwatch with the thin yellow leather strap. Twenty-eight, twenty-nine, thirty, thirty-one, thirty-two- another series of tremors and then silence and stillness.  
  
If he can't wake it up, he'll use it for parts. The Captain could do with actual human muscles.  
  
He wouldn't be bitter about it.  
  
Some bodies just don't take.  
  
Or maybe he isn't good enough.  
  
Or maybe some bodies just don't take.  
  
If he's good enough to keep a zombie stable for weeks, whats a few hours, right? His left-hand goes a little rigid, but he tries to shake it off.  
  
Forty-five, forty-six, forty-seven, forty-eight, forty-nine, fifty, fifty-one, fifty-two, fifty-three, fifty-four- come on come on come on come on come on- he rounds to the minute and starts again. Three seconds and another tremor- convulsion really- and-  
  
“Finally.” He whispers when the body sits up clumsily- jerking motions that are abrupt at the best of times. The thing stands up and almost falls over- half of the upper body weight lands straight on Dref's shoulders, and he crumples a little bit- legs shaky with the sudden force. “S-Stand- Please. On- On your own.”  
  
It does, after a bit of time.  
  
He sometimes forgets, how much time and effort he sunk into The Captain. This thing's chest doesn't raise because it doesn't try to breathe. It doesn't blink because why would it. People make noise while they just exist and it is almost silent in his office.  
  
“Okay.” He says and picks up his quill. “You're f-fine.”  
  
Even if he makes them, touching them is eerie. He hooks the metal nib on the thread keeping the buttons affixed to the man's shirt and tugs, bone popping off and clattering to the floor while Dref's hands remain clean. No blood- no hour old crusty blood.  
  
He's fine.  
  
It's fine.  
  
Getting the shirt the rest of the way off is harder to do, and it takes a needlessly long amount of time, but he's staring at the bruised and battered torso before long, and that's enough to get to work.  
  
He's a pretty decent anatomist when he has to be, and his notebooks are filled with sketches, colored and in charcoal. He thinks if he looks between what he's written before, that he's getting closer to something- either why the body goes stiff the way it does, or why the skin becomes so pliant.    
  
“Did anyone ever tell you this is weird?” Dref jumps maybe a foot into the air and clutches at his chest in some desperate attempt to hold of the heart attack. “And your proportions are really janky.”  
  
Travis has his arms crossed, staring at the pages of Dref's notebook and at the body.  
  
“I-I- I never claimed to- to be an a-artist.”  
  
“Well, that much is obvious.” Travis reaches over Dref's shoulder and pulls the notebook into his own hands, flipping through it. “You can't draw hands at all.”  
  
“Do y-you want some-something? Or are you j-just here too ha- to b-bother me?”  
  
“Column A, Column B, this one isn't bad.” He twists the notebook around, and Dref stares at the drawing he made three weeks ago of The Captain's jaw bone. “And this one's okay too.” It's a light sketch of a bite wound from a body they dredged up with the fish  on the same day. “Gable wanted to have dinner. Team meeting, so the kid doesn't get upset.”  
  
“D-Dinner isn't for a few- a few more hours-”  
  
“I could have come later, but would you really want me to?” Travis gives him the notebook back and wiggles his eye brows. “Cause I would have-”  
  
“I know.”  
  
“And you hate the sound my bones make when I-”  
  
“I-I know- I'm- I'm usually there.”  
  
“Yeah.” Travis smiles- smirks maybe? Lazy and easy. “Take some drawing lessons.” Dref doesn't answer, instead pick up his quill and turning back to the body. “And don't miss dinner. Or you'll tell Gable why yourself.”  
  
That's not an empty threat.  
  
“I won't.”  
  
“Attaboy.”  
  
“No.”  
  
“No?”  
  
“N-No.”  
  
“Shame.”  
  
And then he's alone, the sound of the door closing echoing through the room.  
  
“W-Where w-was I?” He flips through the pages until he finds his spot.  
  
None of his sketches are  that bad- he doesn't know what Travis went on about. And they're just sketches anyway. So. So who cares. It's not like he's going to publish them or anything.  
  
He sits back down and moves the lantern, just to make sure the exit wound of the sword is properly illuminated and starts drawing slowly.  
  
The body jerks sometimes which makes the lines a little thicker when his hand jerks from the sudden movement, but that's obviously expected.    
  
Travis doesn't know what he's talking about.

He's good at what he does.

And his sketches are just fine.

**Author's Note:**

> comments are always encouraged and very very very appreciated
> 
> talk[ to me here](http://iamalivenow.tumblr.com/)


End file.
